The Adventures of Agent M and Agent Ch: Partners
by Eris Perap
Summary: This story is about the two O.W.C.A agents Mundi the Macaw and Chilli the Chinchilla. Mundi the Macaw isn't very thrilled over his new roommate. That is until he gets to know that Chilli the Chinchilla is part of the agency.
1. The New Family Member

**1. The New Family Member**

"Hello, Mundi!"

"Hello!" a happily squeaking sound replied from the blue and yellow feathered parrot.

A relaxed smile spread across the face of Mundi's owner. She slowly lifted her hand to stroke his feathers. He delightfully bent his head down and enjoyed the soft feeling in his neck.

"Did you have fun home while we were shopping at the mall today?" she asked him.

"Fun, fun!" Mundi repeated happily and flapped his wings.

Actually Mundi the Macaw a.k.a. Agent M had been at the O.W.C.A training center during the whole day, and was pretty exhausted, but he didn't wanted to show it to his owners. He didn't want them to worry about him, oh, right, and it might blow his cover as well.

"Roxy, can you give us a hand out here?" a voice shouted from the hallway.

"Coming!" Roxy, Mundi's owner, shouted back. She turned back to Mundi and stuck out her forearm at him so he could climb up. They headed out to the hallway there Roxy's parent and little sister already were busy with unpacking the newly bought stuff from the rustling pouches.

"We've got a little surprise for you." Roxy said to Mundi.

Her father chuckled at her.

"You treat that bird as if he could understand every word you say."

What none of the family members know is that Mundi _do_ understand every word they say. Human language (mostly English) is one of the most important basic lessons at the agency. Mundi was in top of that class, also being the only agent at his division able to talk. (That is, if you don't count two former agents that were employed at the agency during a short time, one of them being a robot and the other one being a human.)

Mundi glanced curiously at the pouches on the floor, trying not to look too exited over whatever his owners had in surprise for him. He sure hoped it was millets, he loves millets.

An audibly movement from a little brown box, that had been hiding behind the now unpacked and imploded pouches, attracted his attention. Roxy's little sister Becky lifted up the box and held it in front of him.

"Look what I've got" she said excited. She seemed to have a hard time resisting the desire to jump for joy since if she'd do that she'd probably shake the box to much.

She put her hand on the top of the box with the fingers over the edge to opened it. Two shiny black eyes attached to a little round gray furry body with two big upright ears on each side of its head looked up from the box.

'That is not millets', Mundi thought a bit disappointed, then he tried to figure out what kind of animal it was. A rabbit? No, it's ears doesn't really look like they do on rabbits. A guinea pig? No, they don't have _that_ big ears. Maybe some kind of a giant mouse? No, wait, he suddenly noticed that its tail was bristly. Is it a squirrel? He didn't remember squirrels having that small tails.

"This is Chilli, she is a chinchilla," Becky said happily, "isn't she cute?"

'A chinchilla?' Mundi had never heard of that before, 'It sure exists a lot of weird animals in this world'.

He came to think of Agent P, who looked like he was some kind of crossbreed between a duck and a beaver.

Chilli leaned over the edge to curiously sniff at Mundi. Mundi recoiled as Chilli's whiskers tickled him.

"You two are going to be best friends", Becky said in a happily childish tone.

'I wouldn't be so sure about that, Becky', Mundi thought, not taking the eyes off the little rodent as it could make a sudden unexpected move. He wasn't very thrilled by now having to share his attention with someone else. At least it seemed like Becky was going to be the one taking care of the … the …, what was it called again? Chihuahua? No, that's a breed of a dog agent at Admiral Acronym's division. Anyway, at least he would still have Roxy.

"Becky, can you please bring the chinchilla's stuffs up to Mundi's room?" Roxy's and Becky's mum said.

'Chinchilla, that's right, that's what it was called... Wait, what did she meant by...?', Mundi suddenly felt how a stormy cloud of anxiety started to take form above him.

"You guys are going to be roommates" Becky said.

'Roommates?!' Mundi could feel how the cloud unleashed it's wet substance over him.

"This is great, I finally get to have my own pet", Becky said, still in her happy exited mood. Then she rushed up the stairs to the second floor, still caring the box with the little hairball that soon was going to infiltrate the peaceful little oasis that once was Mundi's room.

"Don't worry, it'll be fine. You'll get used to it, and if you don't I'm sure we can find another solution", Roxy said, trying to cheer up Mundi.

'Am I being that obvious?' Mundi thought, mad because he hadn't been able to hide his own emotions. He was supposed to pretend to just be a mindless pet, acting like he had no clue of what was going on. If his owners knew about his secret identity he would be send away, never to see them again.

He cared about the Oswalds very much, especially Roxy. She was mainly the one taking care of him. He loved the way she smiles every time she greets him, and how she always laugh whenever he says some kind of stupid word, like 'cookie' or something. He also loves the other members of the family as well, even Becky, though she could get a little annoying sometimes. He would be devastated if anything happened to anyone of them.

He looked up at Roxy's comfortable face, trying to look as happy and clueless as possible.

"Cookie!" he chattered.

Roxy smiled and let out a little giggle. For himself, he thought that no one, _no one_ is ever going to take away that smile from him, not even that little chinchilla.


	2. Roommates

**2. Roommates**

Mundi tried not to look to annoyed when the little chinchilla bedded on its shelf that was placed on the wall at the other side of the room. Chilli's side was smaller than his, but he still didn't like that some of his stuffs had been moved tighter to each other to make room for hers. He was already used to the old distance between all his sticks, swings and pole. Now he had to remember not fly or jump too far to move around.

The little rodent, who had been lying on the shelf for a while now, got up and started to look around in the room, constantly sniffing with its nose. Mundi had wondered why his owner (or maybe he should start to think of them as _their_ owners now, he shrugged a little by the thought) had put Chilli's shelf so high up, but then he saw her jump across the branches, that was spread out in the room at different heights, like a squirrel.

'Great, now I can't even have the air element for myself anymore', he thought sighing. If Chilli would have been a bunny or a guinea pig she would at least just been able to move around at the floor, but, _noo_, Becky had to get a chinchilla of all animals.

"Hey, get back on your own side!" Mundi shouted with his high pitched voice when Chilli landed on one of the sticks that belonged to his side of the room. Chilli didn't take any notice to the cranky parrot, who threateningly started to imitate the growling of a dog. A sweet scent caught her nose and her eyes landed on Mundi's metal pole there his newly filled food bowl were placed.

"Oh no, you don't." Mundi said, thinking the same thought as Chilli. During the course of a few seconds Chilli executed the thought and jumped over to the pole. She immediately took a bite of an applecleft that was placed in the bowl.

"That's it!" Mundi shouted furiously and flew across the room landing on the pole. The little rodent got startled.

"GET OFF!" Mundi screamed. Chilli immediately jumped over to a nearby branch.

"Okay, lets make things clear around here", Mundi said to the frighten chinchilla. "This is _my_ room and this is _my_ food. Everything in here belongs to _me_, and you are not allowed to touch _anything_ here without my permission. You wanna know why? It's because _I_ was here first, and I am not going to let some stupid dumb fulled rat take anything that belongs to me, understood?"

Chilli looked at Mundi with a confused look on her face for a moment. Then she obliviously started to clean herself with her front paws, revealing white fur on her belly that Mundi didn't had noticed before.

Of course he knew that she didn't understand a word of what he said, but he had just been so enrage that he felt that he had to unleash his feelings somehow.

Putting words into action really worked for him. He had learned to like verbal communication. It made things so much clearer, and it was much easier to avoid misunderstandings.

Since he's a secret agent he could only talk with the employees of the agency, though sometimes he wished he could talk to anybody he wanted, without anyone astonishing going 'Whoa, a talking parrot'. He and Roxy could have so much fun together. They could discuss a lot of interesting subjects, like music, school, or, well, anything at all.

Roxy usually tells him everything, even though she thinks he doesn't understand what she says. He knew her deepest secrets, like which boy she has a crush on, and when she is sad or upset he carefully listens to her problem. He does the best he can to always be there for her whenever she's feeling down.

When talking, he usually makes his voice sound a little bit like hers. He could imitate other voices all well, but he liked to imitate her. She had such a sweet and welcoming voice that always made him feel calm. It was also a reminder to him of for whose safety he worked so hard for.

Mundi observed every little move Chilli did as she climbed around the branches heading back to her side of the room. With all his special training in his backpack he could easily take that chinchilla down. If that little creature just as bites Roxy, Becky or anyone he cares about, he will make sure she doesn't repeat the same mistake twice. He is not going to let her take away anything that belongs to him, especially not his family.

* * *

As the sun rose above the roofs of the houses across the street Mundi woke up to a familiar beeping sound. He lifted his beak, that had been buried in his back feathers under his wing while he slept, and lifted his dark gray scaly foot that was decorated with a red ring. He pressed a little yellow button on the ring with one of his wing feathers that made the beep stop.

He stretched his wings and feet, as he always does when he returns from slumber, then he checked the device on his foot again. He pressed another button and a little lock slid into the ring revealing an enlightened screen underneath. The text on the screen said '1 NEW MESSAGE(S)'.

After Mundi had read the message he flew to his metal pole. Major Monogram wanted him to be at his lair now at 6:00 am. That's the time of the day Mundi usually met his boss, he's one of the first agents on the Major's list to be in contact with him in the morning.

Mundi didn't minded having to get up so early every morning, he was a little of a morning bird after all. He'd rather get things done early so he could relax the rest of the day, instead of sleeping half the day away. Besides, the training center wasn't that crowded in the morning compared to the afternoon, so he could get his work started right up.

He turned his head to the other side of the room there Chilli was fast asleep at her shelf. She didn't seem to have noticed the beep call or Mundi being awake at all. Not that it would had made any difference if she saw him sneak away. It's not like she could tell anyone.

He put down his beak in the food bowl and grubbed around among the seeds searching for the secret switch. In the meantime he took the chance to eat some of the food. A hole in the floor behind the pole opened up when he found the tiny lever. After he peeled off the scales of the seeds in his beak and swallowed them he dived headlong into the hole.

Falling through the pipe he made sure to keep his wings close to his body not to hit the walls. A light in the end of the tunnel caught his eyes as his secret lair approached. Just when the pipe ended and the surrounding got wider he quickly turned his head up and stretched out his wings making the speed slow down. Then he gently flapped his wings making the dust on the floor blow around in a little whirlwind. He stepped his feet in the center of the tiny tornado, landing in a pose with his wings up. As the dust around him started to lie down a brown fedora fell on top of his head making the whole entrance complete.

'Now, that's what I call a landing', he thought pretty impressed by himself. (Just don't ask him how many times he'd been trying to do that without leaving any bruises). He knew that his boss liked the agents to make a good entrance as he expected the best out of them. At first Mundi had thought the whole entrance thing was kind of stupid and just a waste of time, but he'd come to actually like the whole process. After all, secret agents were supposed to be heroes that people looked up to; they had to show some style.

He stepped forward to a huge monitor with a big screen that showed the face of a white haired man with a white mustache and a big square nose under a pair of two small eyes that was partly hidden under a gray uni brow. The man's eyes, which had black bags under them as he wasn't as alert in the morning as Mundi, was trying to figure out some sense out of the words written on some papers he was holding.

Mundi took a seat on a chair in front of the monitor. The chair had a hole in the lower part of the backboard there his tail feather were sticking out.

"'Morning, Agent M…"

"'Morning, Major Monogram!"

The startled Major almost lost the hold of the papers in his hand. He'd never get use to having one of the agents actually responding his greeting.

"Well, I've got a mission for you today", Major Monogram said while reorganizing his papers.

"A mission? For _me_, sir?" Mundi said a bit overwhelming. This was not what he had expected.

The truth is that Mundi had never actually got a real mission before since he's still in training. He didn't even have his own nemesis yet, after all, he was still at a young age, only about one and a half year. Usually when Major Monogram called him in for duty was to give him his daily schedule for agent practice.

Agents don't usually get their first nemesis until they are about three to five years old, though there have been some exceptions during special circumstances, like if the mission is at alpha red and the agency needs all help they can get. There are also some agents whose lifespan is very short and need to get in action as soon as possible. Being a macaw, Mundi's lifespan should be about 50 years so the agency didn't prior his training that high.

Major Monogram noticed the confused and anxious look on the parrot's face.

"Oh, don't worry, Agent M, this isn't a alpha red mission", Monogram assured, "far from that actually."

Mundi sighed in relief.

"Puh, sir, you almost gave me a heart attack there. Well, bring it on then …, sir!"

Mundi sometimes forgot how to talk to his superior.

The Major started to look through his papers again.

"We want you to assist one of our new recruits at the training center. She has already learned the basics at the adopt center, but we'd like you to help her learn all our routines."

"I'm on it. You can count on me, sir", Mundi said and made a salute with his wing. He was a little exited over getting his first mission, or, well, at least something that Major Monogram seemed to count as a mission.

"The new agent should be arriving right ... now", Major Monogram said.

Silence spread across the lair. Mundi looked wondering around for someone to appear.

"Carl, I said _now_", Monogram shouted to someone off screen.

"Sorry, sir! I lost my track", a squeaky weak voice said at the other line.

A sliding door opened up to Mundi's lair and a fog of smoke spread across the opening. ('We have a fog machine?' Mundi thought surprised.) At the door entrance a little creature was sitting on a floating chair that slowly moved forward to the monitor. Mundi could hardly believe his eyes when he recognized the furry gray rodent with big ears and white belly.

"Chilli!?"


	3. Agent Ch

**3. Agent Ch**

"Agent M, this is Agent Ch." Major Monogram presented as Chilli's floating chair took place beside Mundi.

Mundi observed the chinchilla in her agent mode. She didn't look as dumb fulled as she did in her pet mode. Her face had a much more serious look, though her eyes looked a little impatient under the brown fedora, which perfectly fitted on her head between the two sideways and slight upward ears.

"Agent C, huh ...", Mundi mumbled thoughtful.

"No, Agent _Ch_" (pronounced as 'she'), Major Monogram corrected, "Agent C is our chicken agent. We are only allowed to use each letter ones as code names, or else it would be to confusing."

"But, wait, sir, of all respect, don't we already have like dozens of agents with the code name Agent P?" Mundi reflected and started to count on his wing feathers.

"There's Perry the Platypus, Pinky the Chihuahua, Peter the Panda..."

"I can inform you, Agent M", Monogram inflicted, "all those agents belongs to different divisions. Perry the Platypus, as you probably know, belongs to my division, Pinky the Chihuahua belongs to Wanda's division, Peter the Panda belongs to…"

"Alright, alright, I get the point... uhm, sir."

Mundi tried to make the last part sound as apologizing as possible 'cause of the fact that he had just interrupted his boss in such rude way.

Major Monogram cleared his throat.

"Well, hrmhrm, anyway, your transport is waiting for you in the garage, so you can get over to the training center immediatly", Major Monogram continued, "We hope that you'll like it at our division, Agent Ch. And Agent M", Major Monogram turned to Mundi, "good luck with your mission."

Both agents saluted to their boss and the transmission was cut.

Mundi turned to Chilli.

"Well, uhm, I guess we should get going", he said to the silent rodent. He still had trouble processing the fact that his new roommate also was part of the agency.

Chilli jumped of the chair and went back to the door she had entered earlier. Mundi followed her. The door slid up and they entered a smaller room that had a big circle round opening in the wall that was plugged with a big pipe that lead to the Danville sewer system. (Mundi started to look around for the possibly existence of the fog machine that was used earlier. He noticed a black box beside the door.) In the middle of the room a gray hover jet decorated with two stripes, one blue and one yellow, on each side, stood. Mundi didn't recognize it, it must be a part of the new equipment. ('How come she got to have such cool stuffs?' he thought a bit jealous.)

He had license for driving this kinds of vehicles, but since he's got the ability to fly he rarely used transporting devices for shorter distances. His usual destination was the training center and that lays just a few blocks away.

He made himself ready to walk over to the other side to take place at the driver's seat, but before he even got to lift his feet Chilli quickly jumped into the hover jet and put her paws on the steering wheel.

"You know how to drive this thing?" Mundi asked.

Chilli nodded.

"Well then, okay, you drive", he shrugged and took place next to her (he couldn't help but noticing how comfortable the seats were). Chilli turned on the ignition and the engine started to run. She steered to the center of the pipe and hit the gas.

As they came out to the sewers Mundi started to wonder if Chilli even knew the way to the training center.

"Do you know where we're heading?"

Chilli pointed at a little screen at the dashboard that showed a digital map over the city marked with two dots, one red that was moving and the other one green with a flag on it.

'When did she took the time to set in the right location?', Mundi wondered, suddenly feeling superfluous. Why would they even needed to use a GPS at this moment, he'd been flying to the training center for almost every day during the last months. He could have just told her the direction. Wasn't that what he was supposed to do? Teach her all the routines?

"You know, you could have told me that you were an agent", Mundi said a bit grumpy.

Chilli made a noise that sounded like 'fzfzfzfzfzfzf' as to remind him that she can't talk.

"Well, at least you could have showed it _somehow_", he said, becoming more and more frustrated, "You could have write a note, or … or just as easy as put your hat on, that would've made a lot of sense to me."

Chilli slowly turned her head to Mundi and glared at him with an expression of annoyance on her face. It wasn't that she didn't had tried to tell him, but it wasn't easy to explain something to someone who didn't want to cooperate.

"Ehm, e-excuse me", Mundi said, feeling a bit awkward over the look the Chinchilla gave him, "w-would you, please, p-put your eyes back on the road again, so we don't, you know, crash?"

Mundi pointed directionally with his wing feather at the road ahead of them. Chilli kept staring at him for a few more seconds before continuing focus on her driving.

When they reached a tunnel that led to the street above them she slowed down the vehicle and switched the settings so they were moving upward while the hover jet still was in horizontal mode. Out of the sewers she switched back to previous settings and followed a road that led to the O.W.C.A head building. She turned off the rockets that made the vehicle hover and pushed a button that precipitated four wheels. The wheels were made for an alternative way of availability that saved them a lots of rocket fuel as the hovercraft also was going on solar power.

Mundi glanced at Chilli, who maneuvered the vehicle like a professional. It seemed unlikely that this was the same animal that he had met just a few hours ago. He suddenly felt ashamed over how he had treated her last night. He hadn't even given her a chance.

"Hey, I'm sorry for yelling at you last night. I-I was just overwhelmed by the sudden news that the Oswalds had brought another pet. I guess I kind of overreacted a little bit."

Chilli frowned. 'A little bit?'

"And I'm sorry for calling you a dumb fulled rat ('You forgot 'stupid'', Chilli thought), I agree, that was pretty mean. I was obviously totally wrong about that, by the way."

Chilli kept carefully listens to him.

"I should have known not to judge someone beforehand. After all, my owners ... uhm, _our_ owners, believe that I'm just a mindless domestic pet."

"Fzfzfzfzfzfzf!" Chilli chirped, and gave him a big smile to confirm that she forgave him.

* * *

A huge wine-red building, surrounded by a big wall, arose in front of them as they reached their final destination. The duo passed the big sign that said 'O.W.C.A secret headquarters' (below the text it stood in parenthesis 'pay no attention to this sign') and stopped by a toll booth guarded by a half sleeping man in a cabin.

"'Morning Rod!" Mundi said. The man startled to a loud snoring sound.

"Passport, please?", he tiredly said in a quite high pitched tune.

The two agents looked into a cubic shaped box. A red laser beamed out of it and scanned the markings on their hats. Rod looked through the database.

"Welcome to the agency, Agent M and Agent C", he said.

"Actually, that would be Agent _Ch_", Mundi corrected, "not to be confused by the chicken agent. You do know that each division only are allowed to use each letter ones as code names, right?"

Chilli smiled thinking of the conversation Mundi and Monogram had had earlier.

"My apology, Agent Ch", Rod said, trying to hold back a yawn.

Rod pulled a ladder and the gate in front of them opened up. The hover jet rolled in to the inner area.

"Well, here we are", Mundi said, "the O.W.C.A headquarters."


	4. At the Agency

**4. At the Agency**

"Just out of curiosity, how old are you?" Mundi asked Chilli as she placed the little hover jet on a relative big square at the yet almost empty parking.

She held her front paws in front of him and held up seven toes.

"Seven? Seven what?"

She pointed at the second letter of the purple cursive O.W.C.A logo that was printed on the dashboard.

'Seven W?', Mundi thought, then a light came above him. "Ah, seven weeks?"

Chilli nodded.

"Wait, you're only seven weeks old and you already know how to drive a hover jet?"

Chilli nodded again, this time with more intense.

"Wow, that is pretty impressive", Mundi said, more to himself rather than to Chilli, "you sure didn't waste any time at the adopt center, didn't you?"

They jumped out of the vehicle and left the parking area. As they headed for the main building they passed by the toll booth there Rod were resting his head at a table. An evil idea came across Mundi's mind as he observed the man's back slowly go up and down.

"Wait, there is something I just _gotta_ do", he said and sniggered mischievously.

The duo stood at the doorstep to the cabin. A light snoring sound emitted from the sleeping man. Mundi cleared his throat, then he made a perfect imitation of Major Monogram's voice.

"GREAT GOOGLY MOOGLY! MISTER, WHAT KIND OF BEHAVIOR IS THIS?"

Rod quickly went up on his feet, panicking waving his arms making a pile of paper on the table fell on the floor.

"Sir? I-I'm so sorry, I …" Rod aborted himself when he noticed the laughing animals at the opening.

"Agent M, that's _not_ funny", Rod said with a mixed feeling of anger and relief.

"Well, at least _someone_ thought it was", Mundi said and made a gesture at the giggling chinchilla, who quickly tried to put on a respecting serious look, which kind of failed since her chest was still visibly hopping.

"Do you ever get tired of doing that?" Rod said irritated.

"Actually, I don't", Mundi admitted and smirked, "by the way, you'd better set your alarm clock on at least 7:00 am. I heard Agent B is getting here earlier today."

Rod gave him a grumpy look. He racked his brain to find something good to say in defense, but he didn't really know how to reply to Mundi's last comment.

"I'll try to remember that", he finally said slowly, still in his grumpy mood.

"Well, we've gotta go. Have a nice day!"

The agents turned around and kept going toward the big building.

"Oh, that Rod! He's a nice guy, but he's _gotta_ stop playing video games all night."

* * *

Since some of the agents come in very large sizes (especially Agent W, the whale agent) the front door was constructed to fit for everybody. As Mundi and Chilli stood in front of the gigantic door, that made them feel more like they were entering a medieval castle rather than a high-technological agency-base, two red lasers scanned their hats as the toll booth had done earlier. A rumbling sound was heard when the door opened up.

"Well, here we are, Chilli." Mundi said as they entered the giant hallway. "By the way, is it okay if I call you that?"

Chilli nodded.

"Oh, good, I just asked since I know some of the agents don't like being called by their first name. Some of them don't even have one. I think that's kind of sad. Oh, this is where we're heading."

They turned in to a corridor with a much lower ceilings there lots of people wearing white lab coats were running around.

"According to the information Major Monogram gave us we are going to meet up with two scientists, Dr. Seger and Dr. Burton. They probably want to put some device at you so they could check out your ratings during the day. At least that's what they did to me at my first day. I wonder if they are still at the same department. Let me check!"

Mundi pulled out a little blue laptop from a tiny implode-sucking bag that every agent at the agency owned. Major Monogram had already added both his own schedule for the day and Chilli's into the computer.

"Yes, yes they are. Floor B24, dept B, room 628, as I suspected."

He set the computer in sleep mode and threw it over his left wing there it instantly got sucked and imploded into the almost invisible bag on his back, like a star that gets sucked into a black hole.

They stopped in front of an elevator with metallic sliding doors. Mundi pressed one of the buttons on the wall beside it. There were two buttons at different heights, one that the humans and other larger animals could reach and one lower for the smaller.

When Mundi pressed the button (guess which one) a ring around it started to glow and a rumbling and swishing sound came from the other side of the wall. The metallic doors went aside and the duo stepped in.

During their journey down (mostly of O.W.C.A lays underground) they listened to some elevator music, a slower cover version of a song that Mundi recognized.

"'Bow, chicka, bow-wow! That's what my baby says! Mow-mow-mow! And my heart starts pumping?' Man, Roxy and Becky listen to that all the time, it's getting on my nerves. I used to like it in the beginning, but now it's just too overdone. When you think of it, it's all just a catchy tune with meaningless lyrics. It's odd that that's the kind of music that goes to the top of the charts. It seems to go through to people, even to me, I can't argue with that. By the way, am I talking to much? Sometimes I have a tense to get stuck in my own dabble. If you think I talk to much just slap me, but don't too hard, okay?"

Chilli made a single nod at him to confirm that she'd understood. She didn't mind him talking to her. She liked having someone talking to her in a more serious way, not acting all fozzy wozzy around her. Even the scientists at the adopt center had sometimes treated her like a cutie patootie. Not that she had anything against it, but it gets annoying in the long run. After all, there's much more to her than just a cute face.

The elevator reached the selected floor and they stepped out of it while Mundi sung the last lines of Gitchee Gitchee Goo.

"'... means that I love you.' That song is going to be stuck in my head whole day, now."

* * *

"Hello, guys! Well, if it isn't Agent Ch. The last time I saw you, you were just a tiny little embryo", Dr. Seger said when the agents entered room 628.

The doctor bent down and shook Chilli's paw.

"Hi, Jonathan! How are things going these days?" Mundi asked.

"Pretty good, actually", Dr. Seger said, "We've manage to do some improvement at the rating device."

"I'm almost done with the last adjustments."

The voice came from a man sitting by a table along the wall. He was tampering on a thing that looked like a tiny donut. He picked up a screwdriver and tightened one of the screws.

"There! Now, Agent Ch", Dr. Burton said as he turned around in his spinning chair to face the other three individuals in the room, "would you, please, get up on that table?"

He pointed at a table that stood in the middle of the room. Chilli did as she was told to, made a quick stopover on a chair beneath, and jumped up.

Dr. Burton walked towards her while holding up the little device.

"With this thing we will be able to keep track of your ratings and results during your practices..."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, I've already told her that", Mundi interrupted, making a waving gesture with his wing.

"Well, hrmhrm", Dr. Burton cleared his throat, trying not to take notice to Mundi's disregarded comment, and continued. "Not only will we be able to check out your physical health but also your brain activity..."

"Can we make things going around here? We have a schedule, you know?" the impatience parrot chattered rudely.

Dr. Burton gave him an evil eye, then he turned back to Chilli.

"May you, please, show me your left front paw?"

"Still working on your manners, huh?" Dr. Seger said to Mundi.

"I'm not done with my ethic class yet."

When the little bracelet had been attached to Chilli's paw Dr. Seger sat down by his computer and waited for it to find the signal emitted from the device.

"Beside, none of you are my superior so I can talk to you however I want", Mundi continued and flew up at the table, landing next to the computer.

Dr. Seger chuckled and rolled his eyes at him.

"Oh, Mundi, you are such a baby!"

A blipping sound came from the computer and a pop-up saying 'connection completed' showed up on the screen.

"Okay, lets see how those sensors are working", Dr. Burton said. "We're starting with the psychological part."

He picked up a bunch of cards and held them in front of Chilli.

"Now, all you have to do is to look at these images", he said to the carefully listening chinchilla.

While switching the cards in front of her eyes Dr. Seger was keeping an eye on the computer screen which showed a digital image of the chinchilla's brain there some colored spots constantly appeared, disappeared and reappeared.

Mundi looked over Dr. Seger's shoulder to take a look at the random images the card showed. One showed a cheese, another a tree, a car, the O.W.C.A. logo, an orange, and … Mundi?

"Hey, why do you even need a picture of me for? I'm in the same room, if you haven't noticed", Mundi said a bit cranky, "That's an awful photo by the way, I look like I'm... Ouch!"

He felt a light pain on his wing there Dr. Seger had snapped him.

"Sorry Mundi, but you're messing up Chilli's sensors", he said to the slight embarrassed parrot.

Mundi stayed silent during the rest of the control checking (much to Dr. Burton's joy). After Chilli had looked through the rest of the cards she got to run on a treadmill for a minute to test the sensors checking her physics.

"Everything seems to be working fine", Dr. Seger said while looking at a pulsing wave on the screen that showed Chilli's heartbeat. "Then, we're done here."

"If we notice anything wrong we'll contact you", Dr. Burton said to Chilli, who had stepped off the treadmill.

Mundi flew off the table and both agents headed for the door. Dr. Seger opened it and showed them out.

"Good luck with the rest of your day, agents!"

"You too, as well", Mundi said and walked out of the room.


	5. The Work of Martial Art

**5. The Work of Martial Art**

"Since your first lesson today in chinchjitsu starts at 8:00 am I suggested we grab something to eat before we're heading for gym. How does that sounds to you?" Mundi asked Chilli while they were walking through the enlightened hallway.

Chilli made a thumbs up. She suddenly remembered that she hadn't got anything to eat for the whole morning. All Mundi had eaten was the seed he'd quickly grabbed while searching for the switch in his food bowl that opened the entry to his lair.

"Good, I know a nice little cafeteria at the second floor."

They took another elevator, now to the song 'I'm Lindana and I wanna have fun' ("Great, now I have _this_ song stuck in my head", Mundi sighed.), and went up to the significant destination.

The cafeteria on the second floor was designed for agents around the size 50 cm (about 20 in) so all the furniture were pretty tiny. ("Well, I _did_ say it was a nice _little_ cafeteria", Mundi reminded.) The sun shined through the big windows which made the daylight circumfusing the whole room. Round tables were spread out in the room. By one of them sat Agent D, the dog, and Agent O, the owl, enjoying their meals. Mundi presented Chilli to them. Both politely greeted her by lifting their hats off, as did Chilli in return.

Mundi and Chilli walked toward the counter to order breakfast. Behind the disk a brown furry mongoose agent was washing off an empty glass. He worked in the cafeteria part time.

A couple of digital menus were standing alongside the counter there the costumers could make their orders. It was a handy way since mostly of the agents can't talk.

"So, what are you up for?" Mundi asked Chilli while pressing on one of the menus touchscreen with one of his wing feathers, showing her some of the alternatives.

Chilli knocked thoughtfully her index toe on her under lip. She didn't really know what to choose.

"I pick out with my orders while you're deciding", Mundi said and kept pressing the screen.

"Hmm, lets see ... I think I'll take a mixture of birdseed, a glass of water, oh, and an apple. You'd like an apple too?"

Mundi surprised himself by the fact that he remembered Chilli liking apples. How did that come? Oh...! That's right...!

He started to feel a bit shamed when his mind replayed the memory of him fiercely yelling at the terrified little rodent.

Chilli stepped in front of the menu and started dialing. She chose some compressed hay, pellets, an apple and a glass of water.

"Hey! Manny!" Mundi shouted to the mongoose over the disk and knocked impatiently at the counter. "We're ready for our orders."

Manny the Mongoose frowned provoked at him, put down the glass he was wiping off and walked over to a computer that had registered their chosen meals. He didn't like Mundi ordering him around like that.

After he had looked through the orders he went into the kitchen. He came back carrying two trays with the selected meals on and put them down at the counter in front of the costumers. He greeted Chilli in the same way as Agent D and Agent O had done, and Chilli politely returned the gesture.

"May I have a straw?" Mundi asked Manny.

Manny gazed determined at him, crossing his front legs in front of his khaki chest.

Mundi sighed.

"May I, _please_, have a straw?"

Manny pulled out a straw underneath the disk and placed it in Mundi's glass.

"Thank you!" Mundi said reluctant.

Having a large upper-bill made it hard for Mundi to drink from glasses, that's why he liked using straws.

The two agents sat down by a table near the window and started chopping.

"Okay, how about we go through our schedules for the day?" Mundi said with some seed-scales stucked on his bill. He pulled out his blue laptop again and held it so Chilli also could see.

"As you see I don't have any classes until 9:00 am, that's because I'm guiding you today as well. We'll both be training at the gym 'til 10:00 am. That's when my course in trigonometric mathematics and your course in communication start. I'll show you the way there. Since my schedules usually is delayed early in the morning we have our lunch break early at eleven. Next class doesn't starts until 1:00 pm. During that time I usually fly home to have lunch with my… _our_ family. Your schedule follows mine there so I guess you're heading home as well, if you don't want to stay, of course, that's your choice. But we'll get to that point later during the day. We'll go through the rest later as well. Do you have any questions?"

Chilli shook her head.

"Then I guess we've cleared things out prior to noon." Mundi said and shut down the computer.

The duo finished their meals and headed for the gym at floor B5. They walked into a big room with a couple of madrasses on the floor. Different types of exercise equipment were standing by one of the walls. A tiny snail slowly slithered across the floor leaving a track of slime behind it. It was heading for a boxing bag lying on the floor that was fifteen times its own size.

"'Morning, Sergei!" Mundi greeted.

Sergei the Snail slowly turned his head around and greeted the both agents by waving one of his/her (land gastropods are two-gendered) antenna that had an eyes attached in the end.

"Don't be fooled by his appearance", Mundi whispered to Chilli (people usually refers Sergei as a male since he's got a male's name, and many think it feels uncomfortable calling him/her 'it'), "Agent S might be tiny and slow, but he's actually one of our strongest and most hard smacking agents. At least compered to his size. Believe me, you do not want to get busted doing something stupid while standing next to him."

Mundi spoke by own experience. Being a talking agent _did_ have its backside.

"By the way, how much do you know about fighting?" Mundi asked Chilli.

Chilli took a fighting position that looked like a vulture that was ready to attack. She took a deep breath and concentrated. Somewhere in the distance the sound of a Chinese flute was heard. Then she quickly threw away a rear leg front kick.

"Pretty much, I see."

They heard a banging sound behind them as Sergei, who had (finally) reached his goal, was smacking the sash back and forth. Mundi shrugged to some painful memories running through his mind while watching the snail.

"'Told ya!"

The duo walked toward a man wearing a white robe and black belt. By his side stood a raccoon agent.

"Good morning, agents! Nice to meet you Agent Ch, I've heard a lot about you from the adopt center."

The man respectfully bowed down with folded hands toward the chinchilla. Chilli did so as well.

"I am Master Ray and this is Agent R."

Agent R and Chilli lifted their hats for each other.

"We are going to teach you the ancient art of chinchjitsu."

"How can it be ancient if it was invented by O.W.C.A?" Mundi asked doubting with his head turned on one side.

"It's just a matter of speaking."

The O.W.C.A had a lots of different training styles programs that was specially designed for each animal species. Since every animal has its own unique appearance they all have different ways of fighting. Some animals got tails and others got bills (one even has both). One of the reasons that O.W.C.A choose to train different kinds of animals to become agents is because of the possibilities to use this vary of abilities. The agents also got to learn some of the human fighting techniques, like kung fu and judo, as well.

"Since chinchjitsu bears a lot of resemblance to raccwondo I've asked Agent R here to show you some of the techniques that I am unable to perform."

Agent R waved his black-and-gray striped tail back and forth. Chilli took a look at her own bristly tail and started wagging it to get used to the movement.

She had already begun to learn some of the human fighting techniques, but she'd never got to include her tail in any one of them for obvious reasons. She was very excited over to learn these new stuffs.

She liked physical practices and she loves to run, after all, she is a rodent, and rodents do have a lot of energy. She is very good at moving fast, she also learns fast as well. She'd got to take extra courses at the adopt center since she had quickly finished the basic lessons.

"We'll start with some warm-up training", Master Ray said, "You can join us as well, Agent M, since you have your lesson with Agent E in an hour."

The agents started by running around the gym ten times, except Mundi who flew.

Chilli couldn't help but think of the running as a contest. She sure wasn't going to let the other two pass by her.

Agent R rolled his eyes while watching the chinchilla exaggerate in front of him. Typical new beginners!

"Okay, Agent Ch", Master Ray said while the agent were stretching their muscles, "a little bird told me that you've already getting started with both kung fu and taekwondo."

Chilli nodded. Mundi looked at her with a quite amazed expression.

"Really? 'Must have been another bird, 'cause I didn't know that."

"I'd like to test your skills. Agent R, would you have the honor?"

The raccoon nodded.

Both mammals took place opposite to each other on one of the carpets in the gym. Agent R took stand in a fighting position with one of his front paws stretched out and the other one bent in front of his chest. Chilli copied the pose.

Agent R attacked with his right front paw. Chilli quickly dodged and took the opportunity to make a low kick, trying to trip the raccoon over. Agent R noticed the attempt and made a loop in the air over the chinchilla's head. He turned the body in the air and landed behind her in the starting pose facing her neck.

He made another attack toward Chilli's shoulder. Chilli grabbed the raccoon by his front leg and tried to throw him over, but, after all, Agent R did had a lot more experience to fall for that old trick. The raccoon hooked on his back leg to hers making the chinchilla loose her balance and fell over as well.

Down on the carpet Agent R quickly rolled over, making the Chinchilla face the carpet. He firmly gripped Chilli's front paw and bent it over her back, making her unable to move.

"Okay, that's enough", Master Ray said and clapped his hands to confirm that the battle was over.

He stepped on the carpet and walked towards the furry animals. Agent R let go of Chilli and both stood up.

"Well done, Agent Ch!" Master Ray commended, "You have proven that the rumors at the adopt center was not incorrect."

Chilli bowed in thankfulness.

"Though, you still have a long way to go. I am willing to help you on your journey, but only if you are ready to cooperate with me and carefully listen to my advices. I won't be able to help you if you don't listen to me. I would like to see a talent like you becoming a true fighter. True fighters are ready for all kinds of challenges. True fighters are ready to do whatever it takes to improve their own skills. True fighter never let themself down. Let me ask you, Agent Ch, are you ready to become a true fighter?"

The chinchilla looked at the trainer with a determined glint in her eye and an excited smile across her cheeks. She sure was ready.


	6. Grab and Go

**6. Grab and Go**

While watching Agent R train some kick practices with Chilli Mundi again started to feel superfluous. Is this all he's supposed to do for the next hour, sit there and do nothing?

Master Ray sat beside him carefully observing Chilli's kicking skills. Mundi watched Agent R blocking the kicks unleashed by Chilli. Had it really been that necessary to bring him? Sure, he's got a tail, but he hadn't come to use it yet. This far they had only practiced kicking. Even Mundi knew how to kick. He couldn't help but feel a little disturbed when looking at that raccoon's masked face.

"You know, Masquerade … I mean Master Ray, I could have shown that move as well", Mundi said, trying not to sound too bothered. "Even I know how to kick."

'Masquerade?' Master Ray thought flummoxed.

"I am aware of that, Agent M, but you still don't have enough experience yet. And your feet are a lot different from Agent Ch's."

Mundi looked down at his own dark scaly feet which consisted of four long toes each ended in four bent dark claws.

"Well, I guess you're right about that," Mundi admitted.

"Talkin' 'bout feet, I talked to Dr. Larsson and she'll come over to discuss with you how to grab your claws so you can learn how to easiest preform the looping hook maneuver."

The looping hook maneuvered was a special fighting move for flying animals that worked by grabbing the foe by the back of its shoulders then make a somersault in the air, which would throw the enemy over and then get smacked to the ground.

"That's about time, then I can finally stop listening to Agent E's nag about that _my grip is too loose_", Mundi said his last words in a mocking way.

Agent E is an eagle and one of the most powerful bird agents at the agency. When she isn't on a mission or taking care of her husband and children she works as a coach for other birds and flying agents at the agency.

A few minutes before the clock stroke 9:00 the bald eagle entered the gym together with a longhaired dark-blonde woman. Agent O sat on her leather-clothed left hand.

"Dr. Larsson, thanks for coming", Master Ray said and walked towards the woman together with Mundi.

Dr. Larsson is an ornithology expert. She takes care of the bird agents at O.W.C.A in many different territories. She helps the geneticists to bring out the best traits from the avian DNA, and when the young birds have hatched she makes sure that they're healthy and that they are growing as they should during their first weeks. She also helps them during their agent practices in occasions like this.

Since she is mainly the one at the agency who's been raising the bird agents she has become a little of a mother to them.

"Hi Sara!" Mundi said happily to Dr. Larsson.

"Hi Mundi, I heard you have a little of a foot problem."

"I don't have any problems, its Agent E who doesn't know how to teach."

The eagle cried angrily at him.

"Stop it, both of you!" Dr. Larsson commanded, like a parent who steps in between two rivaling siblings.

"I think I've already figured out the issues here, so stop acting like nestlings!" she said.

"Yes, mommy!" Mundi said a bit shameful. Agent E looked down in shame as well.

"Okay, from what I've heard", she continued, "you, Mundi, have had a hard time finding the right grip. And the reason that Edna hasn't been able to show you how is because you're a zygodactyl."

"W-Wait! Did you just call me a psycho dactyl?" Mundi said offended.

"No, _zygo_dactyl! That means you've got two toes forward and two toes backward."

"Aha, then, why didn't you just said that?"

"Edna, on the other hand, s'got _three_ toes forward and _one_ backward.", Dr. Larsson continued. "You two use different techniques to grab with them."

Mundi glanced down on the eagle's yellow feet with black claws. How come he'd never thought of that before? It was pretty obvious now that she mention it. He wanted to face palm himself for being so stupid.

"Luckily, we've got another zygodactylie agent around here."

Dr. Larsson made a small movement with her left arm, making Agent O, who seemed to have been dozing off during the conversation, wince.

"Say, how come _you_ didn't know about that?" Mundi asked Agent E wondering. "You've been training him as well, haven't you?"

Mundi did his best not sound to accusing.

"That's because Ollie here never had any trouble gripping his feet, since he is a predator and normally uses them to capture pray", she explained, then turned her head to Agent O. "Would you like to demonstrate your skill to us, my dear friend?"

The tired yellowed-eyed owl uttered a catching 'hoot' and flew across the big room, making almost no sound while flapping his wings.

Since Agent O is an owl, his missions are mostly deployed at night. That's why he gets pretty tired during the days.

He headed for a big standing human-shaped dummy in the room and grabbed it by its shoulders. Lifting it up, he flew back to the others and placed it in front of them, still keeping a hard grip about it.

"I'd like you both to take a look here", Sara said and turned the woolen doll around to show its neck there Agent O had his thick claws burying into the ragged beige fabric.

She bent down to show Mundi and Agent E. Mundi flew up on her shoulder to get a better view.

"You see here." she pointed at the owl's external backward toe that was slightly longer than the others. He had it tightly closed around the dolls armpit.

"This toe acts similar to the human thumb. On you, Edna, it goes like this."

She pretended to grab the toe between her thumb and index finger, then she made a gesture pulling up the fake toe, making it point forward.

"This gives you a great upper-grip."

She held demonstratively up her both hands with the knuckles upward and closed finger, like if she was holding on to a fence.

"Ollie and Mundi, on the other hand, s'got more of a sideward under-grip."

She turned her hands over, making her thumbs point sideward up.

"This starts to feel more like a biology class rather than a fighting class", Mundi said.

"Well, after all, martial art is about five percent fighting and 95 percent technical skills", Master Ray inflicted.

Mundi startled a little by his sudden comment. He had completely forgot he was still around.

"Thanks for sharing your knowledge with us, Dr. Larsson", Master Ray said to Sara, "this will help us a lot in our development of parrate."

Parrate is the special fighting style for parrots.

"Glad I could help!" she said.

"Well, Agent M, I think it's time for you to go for the other five percent of your training now," Master Ray suggested.

"I'll stick around for a brief moment, to see that things turn out well", Sara said.

"I have to head back for Agent Ch's lesson", Master Ray said. He excused himself and headed back for the two furry agents that now were practicing punches.

"Ah, Agent Ch! I heard she's your new roommate", Sara said to Mundi, "she's supposed to be a real talent."

"Well, maybe", Mundi mumbled, "should we get started, or what?"

Agent E nodded in agreement.

"May I suggest that we use the training area outside?" Mundi said. "It's more roomy."

"Sounds like a plan."

"Hey! Chilli!" Mundi shouted across the gym. The chinchilla took a break from her training in preventing punches unleashed by Agent R with her forearm and turned to where the voice came from.

"I'll be training at the outside arena. It lies behind this building to the rightmost. Just take the elevator to the entry-floor, then head through the great hallway and follow it to the backyard."

Chilli made a thumb up.

"Okay, I'll see you later", Mundi said, and the birds together with Dr. Larsson walked out of the gym.

Sara stared a bit wondering at Mundi for a short while.

* * *

"Thank you so much for your service around here, Ollie", Sara said to the yawning owl agent, "now you can finally fly home and get some sleep, bud."

Agent O hooted thankfull and took an almost soundless flight towards the clear blue sky.

By observing the owl Mundi had learned a lot and he has got much better in just half an hour.

The gang stood on a big grassy demarcated area with slightly gritty madrases spread across. The big wine-red O.W.C.A building arose behind them with the metallic parts around the windows dazzled reflecting the rays of the sun. Diverse dinguses where laying around the gang, things that Mundi had been practicing the looping hook maneuver on. They've been training at different targets, both moving and non-moving objects, smaller and bigger, softer and harder, and at different distances. The objects had been anything from sashes and balls to vary formed rocks and even themselves.

"This is why I don't like physical activities, you always end up getting hurt", Sara said while rubbing her ached back.

"Fzfzfzfzfzfzf!"

The gang turned around and saw the little chinchilla walking towards them. She looked pretty exhausted, but happy, and she was holding a water bottle.

"Chilli!", Mundi replied happily to his chirping friend. "Did Master Ray finally let you have a break?"

Chilli nodded and took a slurp.

"Hey, d'you wanna see how the master of parrate has been doing lately?"

Agent E sighted and rolled her eyes. Master of parrate? He is the only one who performs it.

"Can you hit me up, Sara?"

"Hit _you_ up? Who's been the one taking the hits here? No, you have to perform on this sash instead", she said a bit cranky and threw a beige jute sash containing sand in front of him.

"Fine, then!" Mundi said a bit frustrated. He'd hoped for making a good impression, showing the _so _talented chinchilla that he indeed also knew some good tricks.

He flew squinted upward against the sun. Five meters over ground he started circulating around the training area and turned the eyes to the center at the target below.

Calculating the best way to near the object he dove down headlong in a downgoing skateboard-ramplike bow. All that lair entrance training sure did come in handy he suddenly realized when he started flying alongside the ground.

Right over the target he pulled out his legs and closed his claws around it still keeping his speed forward. When the sash let go of the ground he bent his head down and curled up into a ball. The object circled vertically over him and landed on the ground with a loud smacking sound.

Grains of sand blow out through the small holes in the fabric during the smack, creating a sandy cloud around it.

A clapping sound heard behind them. It was Master Ray.

"Splendid!" he said.

Mundi proudly smiled at him in gratitude.

"You ladies seem to do fine here", Master Ray said.

Mundi's smile dropped.

"Ladies?"

"Ops, sorry Mundi, I forgot."

Chilli looked interrogative at Mundi.

"Yeah, they found out just six months ago that I am actually a male", Mundi explained, "Heh, who knew?"

"Luckily, I manage to reason with the geneticists to reanalyze your DNA. At least your family didn't had to changed your name."

"Luckily? What? Does it really matters that much? Does it really matter what gender you are? I mean, I am still the same parrot as I was when I hatched."

"If you want to know my opinion", Sara said, "I don't think it matters whether you're a boy or a girl, or even a hermaphrodite, ..."

Coincidentally Sergei the Snail slithered by at that moment. He happily turned a smile to Sara.

" … at least not to the society. However, it does matter to our scientific fact, 'cause we need your right DNA to identify you for our technological equipment, like the DNA scanners."

"The security system sure wasn't nice to me", Mundi said grumpy, remembering all the times when the agancy's system had refused to let him get access to some areas. He'd even had automatic laserguns fired at him at light-speed while an alarming robotic voice kept screaming 'INTRUDER ALERT! INTRUDER ALERT!'

"Well, anyway", Master Ray said, "I just come to tell you two that you've done well today, and that you can dismiss now. Don't get late for next class!"

Both birds and mammals took farewell and went for different directions. Mundi and Chilli headed back inside the building.

While showing Chilli the way to her class in communication Mundi noticed her sometimes staring puzzled at him.

"Let me guess, you thought that I was a girl all the time, huh?"

'Me? Oh, no, no I didn't.' Chilli pointed at herself, trying to act as innocent as possible, and mendaciously shook her head.

"Yeah, right!" Mundi said in disbelieve. "But it's okay, it's not that big of a deal after all."

Chilli looked up on her feathered companion and smiled. He might be an arrogant self-centered loudmouth, but he sure spoke wisely.


	7. Talents

**7. Talents**

A high scratching sound reverberated through the classroom when the teacher pressed the white crayon against the dark-green blackboard. All the students shrugged together in chorus to the obnoxious sound, at least those with good hearing. (Agent F, the koi fish, just looked uncomprehending at his classmates outside his bowl.)

Mundi drew a copy of the isosceles triangle on the board. He had his weight alongside his lower part of his left wing that was placed over the ruler he was using to make straight lines across a checkered paper. While drawing along the ruler with his right wing he slipped a little with the left one, mistakenly making the otherwise perfectly straight line suddenly end in a jagged down-going bow.

A snickering sound came from the seat at his left. It was occupied by a chimpanzee agent.

"What's the fuzz about?" Mundi snapped at him.

The chimpanzee looked towards the board, acting like all he did was listening to the teacher's lecture.

"Now that we know the length of the opposite line to the given angle we can easily find out the length to the others lines as well as their angles …"

Mundi picked up a rubber and started erasing the rugged part on his notes. Then he tried to extending the line by placing the ruler along it, but he didn't managed to place it exactly so the lengthen part turned slightly upwards, visible thanks to the checkered paper. Mundi grunted when he ones again had to pick up the eraser. He glanced over at his neighbor who was smirking at him in amusement.

"'You think this is funny, Marshall? You have a really weird sense of humor."

The chimpanzee held up his hands in front of him and flickered his fingers. He was the Agent M of Admiral Acronym's division. Mundi didn't get very well along with him. That monkey is such a showoff who thinks he knows it all, at least according to Mundi.

"Well, at least _I_ don't need fingers to know that you don't spell communication with _one m_. You might consider the use of a lexicon before publishing anything", Mundi said and sneered.

Agent M worked part time as a typist at the agency. He's usually the one typing the schedules, scripts and other informative notes; both for the agents and for the superiors.

The primate started to make gestures with his hands. He knows sign language. In the air he spelled out a sentence in front of Mundi.

'At least I have a job', it said.

"Yeah, but that doesn't mean you know how to _do_ it."

Agent M chattered angrily at him and started to jig at his seat.

At Mundi's other side sat a plagued turtle agent named Terry. Terry the Turtle buried his forehead in his both orange forefeet and sighed loudly. Why do those two _always_ have to fight?

Agent M spelled out another gesture at Mundi. The parrot dropped his lower beak, hugely offended, and uttered a gasping sound.

"I CAN _NOT_ BELIEVE YOU JUST SAID THAT TO ME. YOU … _YOU MONKEY!"_

"AGENT M! WHAT'S WITH ALL THE NOISE AROUND THERE?" the teacher suddenly yelled.

Both agents instantly sat up straight. All the other agents in the room turned around in their chairs and stared at them. Mundi nervously started to roll his thumb feathers. Then he turned to the chimpanzee.

"Yes, Agent M, what's with all the noise?" Mundi said indicting to his neighbor.

_"Agent Mundi the Macaw!"_ the teacher slowly said establishing.

The parrot sighed disgruntled. 'Perfect!'

"Of course! Just because _I'm_ the only agent around here who can talk, _everything_ has to be _my _fault." Mundi said grumpy in a sarcastic way.

"Have you even been listening to anything we've gone through today?" the teacher asked and determined crossed the arms in front of the chest.

"Uhm… Yeah… Of course I have", Mundi lied and put on a fake smile.

"Well then! I guess you don't mind solving this problem on the board, don't you?" the not-so-easily-fooled teacher suggested.

"Sure not… heheh … no biggy!" Mundi said nervously.

He'd jumped off the chair and slowly walked across the room between the different sized seat-places, occupied by different species of animals. They all stared expectantly at him.

He felt his heart pound while flying up at the desk that was placed in front of the blackboard right next to the wall. While the teacher placed the crayon between his two outer right wingfeathers he noticed in periphery how the chimpanzee evilly smirked at him.

'You won't get away with this', Mundi thought, giving him a short glaze before he turned his head up to the board and started to read the badly written white text on it. Next to the text, a picture of a right triangle had been drawn.

While thinking, he obliviously started to knock the white crayon against his black beak leaving white spots on it.

'Hmm, let see … You wanna know the two angles next to the hypotenuse. Since the triangle is right you know that the third one is 90 degrees. The lengths of the cathethuses are that and that. Well, with that known you can easily find the length of the hypotenuse.'

Mundi started to write the Pythagorean' theorem and put in the given values into the formula on the board. He turned to a calculator that was placed next to his feet. After pressing some buttons on the gadget, that was about half of his size, he wrote a number next to diagonal line of the triangle.

'Okay, with that cleared you can use the law of sine to find the quotient between the length of the hypotenuse and its opposite angle. And…'

A high-strung tinkling feeling inside him spread out through his veins when he realized that he was actually able to solve this problem.

'Since you already know the value of the cathethuses you can find out their angles!'

Eagerly he dialed the calculator once again and wrote number 36 in the triangle's upper corner.

"Now, you could use the sine law again to find out the other angle as well. Or ... You can as simple as just subtrahend the sum of the other two with 180 degree."

Mundi was so pleased with himself that he didn't notice that he was thinking out loud.

"I don't even need a calculator to figure out that the answer to the second angle is 54 degrees."

Energetic he wrote the number in the lower corner of the figure. He made a hasty line below the two computed numbers to mark the answers to the question. After marking the upper answer as well he proudly made a little twirl at the desk that ended in a pose there he pointed at the teacher with the crayon.

"Tell me! Am I right or am I right?"

The teacher checked through Mundi's calculation and raised the eyebrows.

"Well done, Agent M! Very well done!"

"And _you_ thought I wasn't paying attention."

"Well, you can go back to your seat now."

Mundi returned the crayon to the teacher, then he flew off the desk and victoriously danced back to his seat. He managed to catch the eyes of the disgruntled chimpanzee.

"_Now_ who's laughing?" he said quietly.

The minutes passed by while the class kept going. A knocking sound came from the door. It was opened up by a bleached freckled teenage boy with curly red hair and purple glasses.

"Sorry for interrupting the lecture!" the boy said in weak squeaky tune. "I'm here to get Agent M."

Mundi and his left-side neighbor both lifted their heads at him, and so did also a mouse agent at the front row.

"Uhm, that would be Agent Mundi the Macaw", he explained when he noticed the confusion in all the Agent M's faces.

"It's always me, isn't it?" Mundi said joking.

"Major Monogram would like to see you."

The chimpanzee snickered and smirked at Mundi.

'No way! It can't be? Not already?' Mundi thought, feeling a lump taking form in his throat. 'How fast does information spreads around here really?' Well, this _is_ a high-technological agency-base.

"'C-coming!" Mundi stuttered worried and walked towards the door.

'This is so unfair.' he thought while the teenager closed the door after them.

"The Major is at his office. I'll walk you there", the boy said.

"Yey! Way to go, Carl!" Mundi said very unenthusiastic.

The confused Carl scratched his head with his index-finger while watching the parrot slowly walk through the hall with his head down. He was about to ask what's the matter, but he decided not to.

Major Monogram had his office in the part of the O.W.C.A building that lies above ground. They passed by some cubicles, there higher qualified agents were working, before entering a room with large windows that had a view over the parking. Mundi managed to get a quick glimpse of the small gray hover jet before it was hidden behind the backboard of a dark-gray spinning chair there the Major sat. He was going through some papers on the desk in front of him. His eyes lifted up when Carl and Mundi entered.

"Ah, Agent M!" he said in his deep voice.

"S-sir!" Mundi said nervously.

"There's something important I'd like to discuss with you about."

"In my defense, sir, I think you should know that it actually was Marshall the Monkey… eh, the Chimpanzee, who started it all."

Major Monogram lifted his gray unibrow and looked wondering at him. For some reason Mundi started to think that this wasn't about the yelling in the trigonometric class.

"Eh, hrmhrm! Actually I wanted to talk with you about your work with Agent Ch."

"Oh!" Mundi said and laughed a bit embarrassed. "Well, that is going just fine, sir."

"That information has already been passed on by Master Ray and Dr. Seger and Dr. Burton."

"Uhm, okay … sir?" Mundi still wasn't sure in which occasions he was suppose to call his boss 'sir' or if he has to say it in every sentence.

Major Monogram started to tamper with the mouse to a stationary computer on the desk.

"From what we've known the progress with Agent Ch has been far more successful than anticipated", the Major said while scrolling.

"You tell _me_? That girl already knows how to drive and she's already mastered some fighting technics. Is it really true that she's only seven weeks old?" Mundi asked wondering.

"... sir?" he quickly added.

"According to her birth certificate yes."

Mundi started to think of the few hours he'd spent with Chilli during the day. The chinchilla had always acted so serious and self-going during practicing and she was always so polite and respectful to other employees at the agency. She seemed more grown-up than him though he was much older in retrospective.

Mundi couldn't imagine how it's even possible to learn so much in only your first weeks of your life. Himself, he could hardly remember his time at the adopt center. When _he_ was seven weeks old his plumage wasn't fully grown and he still called Major Monogram 'dad'.

Come to think about it he couldn't remember himself doing anything that had been directly useful for the chinchilla. Yet, there was so much that he _could've_ done if he'd only got to actually _do_ his job. He sighed frustrated.

"Well, if you ask _me_… No! Wait! I am supposed to ask for permission to speak freely, right sir?"

"Go ahead, Agent M", Major Monogram said patient. He tried to keep in mind that Mundi's maturity development still was about the same level as a seven year old human child. Even though Mundi's erratic and arrogant ways of speaking to him sometimes got on his nerves he still didn't wanted to be too harsh at him.

"Thank you, sir!" Mundi said and took a deep breath before continuing. "If you ask me, I really don't see the reason why I need to guide her. She practically already knows everything around here. She'd memorized the agency area, both inside and out. I was going to show her the way to her class recently, but it ended up _she_ showing _me_ the way instead. She'd even had pre-programmed the GPS in the hover jet though she had a living guide-post in the seat next to her."

Mundi started to feel all frustration erupt from him like a volcano.

"I could have helped her practicing at the gym, but _noo_, that did that raccoon so much better."

"Are you jealous at Agent R?" Carl asked suprized.

"Huh? No! No no, that was not what I meant", Mundi flapped his wings abruptly. "What I really mean is … "

Mundi aborted himself to take a second to calm down.

After all the anger inside had been blown away like dust in the wind, underneath, the skeleton of a sad and unappreciated modern dinosaur was revealed.

"I believe I've got so much to give, but it feels like nobody wants to give me a chance."

Glancing up from the computer screen Major Monogram noticed that the parrot was on the verge of tears. Sighing he rubbed the unibrow with his thumb and index finger. 'How come that bird always thinks the worst of everything?'

"Agent M?"

The man made a gesture with his hand to show that it was okay for Mundi to hop up on the table to face him better.

The Major gave him a comforted smile.

"Everything isn't all about you", he said in a calm, yet determined, and maybe slightly amused, deep tune. "Carl!"

The teenage boy reacted to his name.

"Go tell Dr. Seger and Dr. Burton that the installments have been finished."

"Ay sir!" Carl said and went out from the office, closing the door after him.

Mundi and Major Monogram could hear Carl's steps rash through the hallway. Then they heard a crashing sound and an angry mew from a cat.

"Sorry, Agent K!" Carl's squeaky voice was heard from the other side of the door.

"Carl! How many times do I have to tell you not to trip over the agents?" Major Monogram shouted at him.

"Sorry, sir!"

Mundi laugh a little. 'Oh, that Carl!'

"Agent M?" Major Monogram said to re-catch the parrot's attention. Comforting the young agents wasn't really a part of his job and nothing that he was very good at in general either. Though, his work _did_ include supporting the agents with useful facts.

"First of all, you need to learn not to jump to conclusions to quickly. I can assure you, everything has a perfectly good explanation. I was trying to tell you that when you got here, but you didn't let me finish."

It stroked him like a snap on his bill when Mundi suddenly realized that the Major actually got a very good point there. After all, he'd never even wondered over why his boss had called him in for in the first place. And, indeed, he _had_ jumped to conclusions that hadn't even been relevant.

He was stung with shame over his sudden, probably unnecessary, outbreak earlier. Excused he smiled at his boss and snickered a bit embarrassed.

"Sorry, sir!" Mundi said, imitating the exact same squeaky voice as Carl.

Major Monogram hid a laughing smile behind his white mustache and put on a super serious look.

"True agents always overlook the situation before acting", he said. "Remember that, Agent M!"

"I will, sir!"

"Now, back to why I called you here", Major Monogram started, "I have to clear things out for you. When I gave you this mission this morning I didn't gave you all information."

Mundi turned his head on one side and looked confused at his boss.

"I know you probably don't think so", Major Monogram continued, "but this mission is actually more important than it might seems."

The Major started to work with the computer again.

"As I mentioned before, the progression with Agent Ch has been far more successful than anticipated. I've been reviewing the received information and I've made the decision to sign her up for the level one agency test."

"Already? But, sir, that test is tomorrow. She ain't prepared for that, she just arrived", Mundi said a bit shocked.

"I am aware of that, Agent M. That's the reason I assigned her preparations as a mission. The agency wants her out on the field as soon as possible."

Major Monogram turned the computerscreen around to show the parrot what's been going on. A diagram was lightening up the screen showing some curved lines in different colors. Mundi recognized this kind of diagram and could read that many of the chinchilla's results was high above average.

"Sir, may I ask, how come that you didn't tell me about this earlier?"

The Major turned to Mundi and smiled furtive.

"Because this mission is actually a part of your training as well."


	8. Rackin' My Brain Here

**8. Rackin' My Brain Here**

Bright sparkles twinkled in the chinchilla's two shiny black eyes.

_'Really? Me?'_

Chilli pointed at herself as to ask if it really was her Major Monogram was referring to.

"Correctly, Agent Ch, we've discussed it and you are here by qualified to perform the first test in your agent training."

A huge smile spread across the chinchilla's face, revealing two big yellowish front teeth. She was so happy and thankful that she could have jumped up and hug her boss, but that might be inappropriate, she thought.

"I know this is a last minute sign up, but I expect you to do your best to make these few hours well spent."

Chilli saluted her boss by lifting her right paw. 'I won't let you down, sir.'

"Agent M will help you with the preparations."

"I've already passed that test so I know what you're up for, bud", Mundi said. "Believe me, this test won't be no piece of cake. You will be facing troubles, young lady."

After the Major had acquired Mundi with all data he needed to know about the upcoming test, they had, together with Dr. Seger and Dr. Burton, gone through the results that Chilli's wristdevice had been sending out.

"This is outstanding", Dr. Burton had burts out. "I knew that the genetics had chosen her DNA very carefully, but _this_."

"She also got genes for quick learning, that's why she is so specialized in many different areas", Dr. Seger had explained.

"You guys sure made a good job creating her", Mundi praised, then he went through the sentence he'd just said. "That sounds horrible, by the way."

He suddenly found it hard imagining that nice and sweet little chinchilla being an advanced genetic experiment. But, after all, that's what all the agents of the O.W.C.A are, at least mostly of them.

"Well, every diamond still has its flaws", Dr. Seger revealed.

"'You mean she ain't perfect?" Mundi asked.

"Agent M, _nobody's_ perfect. Not even if you are genetic enhanced.", Major Monogram said.

_"You,_ if anyone, should know that, Agent M", Dr. Burton said. Mundi noticed the hidden insult in his tune and gave him the evil eye.

"I pretend I didn't hear that, Dr. Button." Mundi said.

Dr. Burton sighed, highly irritated.

"For the last time, it's _Burton. NOT BUTTON!"_ the doctor corrected frustrated.

"I know", Mundi admitted, "but it's much more fun to call you Button 'cause you always get so upset."

"Agent M! Stop teasing the doctor!" Major Monogram commanded.

"But-but, sir, he started it", Mundi stuttered a bit offended.

_"It doesn't matter who started",_ the Major almost yelled. "You got to stop get yourself into trouble all the time. By the by, what was it that happened between you and Agent M of Wanda's division earlier?"

Dr. Seger couldn't help but quietly laugh a bit at the situation. 'Typical Mundi the Troublemaker!'

"Uhm… Eheh… Well, you see, sir…", Mundi began a bit embarrassed, but the look on the Major's face told him that he wasn't really asking for an explanation. Instead, the parrot decided to pull himself together and act a bit more mature for once.

"Sir, I apologize. I'll try to behave better." Mundi assured.

"Good! Now, Dr. Seger", Major Monogram turned to the doctor, "would you, please, like to proceed with the research result?"

"Yes, I would like you to take a look at this."

Dr. Seger picked up a remote controller from his lab coat pocket and pointed it to a big TV-screen. The image pictured Chilli's brain seen from above.

"This video shows what has been going on inside Agent Ch's mind lately."

"Talk about intruding someone's private life!" Mundi mumbled.

"I am fast forwarding this", Dr. Seger said, completely ignoring Mundi's comment, and pressed a key.

The colored spots on the image started to switch in size and places as a digital clock in the right corner was rolling with the minutes going double as fast as real life seconds.

"This first part of the video is from 9 am today", Dr. Seger said.

"Ah, from gym class!" Mundi said cognizing.

"The sensors are picking up Agent Ch being very determinate and focused", the doctor explained.

Mundi took a closer look at the image, observing the different colored spots.

"Yeah, you're right, John. You can see that on the activity around the amygdala. And… now… it's increasing…" His last words came out more and more onerous the redder the middle part of the brain turned.

He glanced down at the time in the corner and then kept observing the image there some blue parts had started to appear.

"C'me on girl, you gotta stop daydreaming, and focus on your communication class instead", Mundi cried out at the screen, completely oblivious to that the three elderly men were staring at him with amazed impressions.

The video kept rolling and Mundi managed to discover a more and more cohesive connection between the rainbow-colored areas. When the film was over he turned his feathercovered head to Dr. Seger.

"I see the problem here, John", Mundi said in a surprisingly serious tune. "She still got some difficulties in word comprehension and understanding."

Major Monogram looked at Dr. Seger as if to ask for a confirmation if Mundi's statement was correct.

"He is right", Dr. Seger said.

"This means Agent Ch might not be able to pass the test", the Major said a bit worried.

"Well, her physical skills _are_ still very impressive", Dr. Burton reminded them. "If she manages to make a good impression at the judges, she might compensate for that."

"You mean she still got a chance?" Mundi asked hopefully.

"That depends on the judges results. And in the worst case, she has to retake the test next month."

"I don't really see the problem with why you can't just let her wait a month, or so," Mundi said. "Four weeks ain't that far away. Or… Wait! Is her genetic code instable?"

Mundi suddenly remembered that short time living agents has higher priority when it comes to agent training.

"Well, _that_ would explain why she has got such good genes. D'you know, guys, you can't just put in any different kinds of traits without expecting that the structure won't collapse. That's what happens when you mix with nature."

The three men, once again, stared wondering at the parrot.

"I'm jumping to conclusions again, ain't I?" Mundi said a bit excusing.

"We-we still haven't found any notable changes", John said while scratching his forehead. "Are-are you reading extra biology at your spear time?"

"Yeah! What?" Mundi shrugged.

Dr. Seger thought for a while, then he turned to the Major.

"Major Monogram, may I come with a suggestion?"

* * *

"Hey, I was thinking, after lunch, why don't you and I go through the test together", Mundi suggested to Chilli while they were walking across the parking.

"We'll probably have plenty of time for that. After all, our lunch break stretches over two hours."

The duo headed for the gray hover jet that looked ridiculously small compared to the two larger cars parked each side of it. Mundi was just about to ask if he could drive the vehicle this time, but before he'd even got to open his beak the chinchilla had already taken a jump onto the driving-seat. She immediately started dialing the devise on the dashboard.

Mundi sighed.

"Girl, it's cool that you know how this stuff works, but you don't need to use it right now", Mundi said, leaning over the door to the hover's passenger seat. "I'll guide us home."

Chilli looked a bit dubious.

"Hey, this is the stuff you need to practice on", Mundi reminded her.

In this morning he had felt offended when she'd chosen to use the GPS in front of asking him for direction, but that was before he got to know about her lacks of linguistic proficiency.

Chilli made a registering nod at him and put both front paws on the steering wheel. He's right, if she wants to become a professional agent she _need_ to learn this. And the test is tomorrow so there is no time to waste.

"Well settled!" Mundi said and took place at the seat next to her.

Chilli started up the engine and slowly backed out from the rectangular parking spot that probably would have fitted for four hover's of the same size.

"Just head for the tool booth and then take the right", Mundi directed.

Chilli followed his lead and drove toward the exit. They said hi to Rod, and went out on the open road.

"Now you go straight forward until I tell you anything else", Mundi said and pointed demonstratively with his whole wing on the road ahead. "I'm going to show you a different way to our house so we don't need to go down the sewers. Not to be picky, but that's just _ew!"_

Mundi made a nauseated rejecting gesture with his both wings in a very feminine way.

"'U're copyin' this?" Mundi spluttered very obscurely.

"I mean, do you understand what I am saying?" Mundi clarified before the chinchilla even got a chance to go through what her companion had mumbled about.

Chilli nodded at him while keep on driving.

"Good, I just wanted to be sure 'cause this is what my mission is about, after all. Well, I think it is … at least the half of it. The other part still racks me. You see, before you were called in, Major Monogram told me that he wouldn't tell me what this mission fully is about. All he said was that it's a part of _my_ training as well."

Mundi quoted his boss while mimicking his deep voice.

"_'_After all, when we hand out missions for our agents we usually don't completely know what the enemies are up to. A part of an agent's job is to find out that by themselves before putting a stop to it._'_ Did you knew", Mundi said in his own voice, "sometimes the only information the agency is able to impart the agents with is what their nemesis had for breakfast? Well, I know that the number one rule in the agent's manual is to be suspicious about everything, but _still_. Hey! Are you listening to anything I'm saying? You do know this is mainly, if not _only_, what you need to practice on? The meaning of words?"

Chilli nodded while still keeping an eye on the road. She did understand mostly of what the parrot said. Sure, sometimes it just sounded like blur, partly because Mundi sometimes talked a bit fast, but she managed to go through the sentences in her mind and make some sense out of it all.

Smiling to herself, she thought about what Mundi had just said. 'Wow, it must require a high degree of scientific knowledge to suspect that someone is up to no good just by looking at their meal.'

"I'll tell you what, the verbal part _does_ plays a major roll to pass the test", Mundi continued. "Hey, maybe that's why Major Monogram handed this mission to me, you know, 'cause I can talk."

'You don't say', Chilli thought ironic.

"Any other agent would probably have a hard time to handle this. After all, how are you supposed to teach something if you're not able to perform it yourself?"

The duo entered the denser parts of the city. Mundi kept on talking and Chilli started to wonder if the parrot even was paying attention to where they were going. Herself, she had no idea of where they were. She didn't knew Danville that well yet.

"Though, I don't really see how this has anything to do with me. The boss _did_ mention that I've got a mainly part in this mission. If it's only because of my talking ability I'm going to be very disappointed…"

"Fzfzfzfzfzfzf!?" Chilli hastily chirped to catch the parrot's attention.

"What?"

Mundi was pulled out from his own loud-sharing thoughts.

Chilli pointed at the road in front of them and stared asking at him with wide open eyes.

"Just keep going", he said calmly and waved nonchalant with his wing, but then he hasty started to take a more careful look at the stores they were passing by.

On the right side of the road a couple of meters ahead, Mundi noticed the two large figures of Paul Bunyan and Babe the Ox standing outside Paul Bunyan's Pancake Haus. The two statues got bigger the more they approached the restaurant. Taking a close look, you could see that Babe's head had been combined to its neck with silver tape after a certain incident when a giant robot had bumped into the statue.

"Okay, here you can start the rockets", Mundi said right after they had passed the restaurant.

Chilli switched settings on the vehicle and the two animals leaned back in the seats when the hover jet headed upwards.


	9. Sweet and Spicy

9. Sweet and Spicy

"Now we're going for the Museum of National History", Mundi said when the hover jet reached the height of the roofs of the lower merged buildings. "It lies behind that big purple building that looks like giant elongated sewing machine."

Chilli steered towards the given direction. Flying above the lower buildings and snaking between the higher skyscrapers they approached the building. When they got close enough Chilli managed to distinguish the purple text 'Doofenshmirtz Evil Inc.' on a big green sign that covered the upper part of the tall building.

"Head for the park over there", Mundi pointed with his blue outer wing-feather at a big grassy open area a few kilometers behind the building to the left.

"You see that beige building in the outskirts of the park, the one with the three pennants on its roof? That's the museum."

People that strolled around in the park didn't seem to take notice to the gray hover jet flying a few meters above their heads.

"You can park on the roof behind the small tower to the left", Mundi said while he looked down at the humans below, making sure nobody saw them coming by. He figured people wouldn't easily let two animal agents in a hovering car slip their minds if they managed to catch a glimpse of them.

Chilli drove above the museum to its backside. Decreasing the power from the four rockets, they slowly lost height, placing the small vehicle on the dark-reddish roof, right behind the left tower decorated with one "small" cupola (compared to the much larger cupola in the middle) and a waving red pennant on top of it.

Chilli pulled out the key from the ignition, and both animals stepped out of the hover jet.

"Follow me!" Mundi walked towards the wall of the tower. Joining him, Chilli observed the parrot pulling up one of the beige "bricks", revealing a round red button underneath. Pressing the button some of the bricks next to them started to give way to a dark down going tunnel behind the wall.

"This pipe will lead us to the backyard of our house", Mundi explained. "I'll go first. You wait a few seconds before coming after, so I don't get your kickboxing paws in my neck, please."

Chilli copied and watched the parrot dive into the darkness. Standing close to the opening she felt a light sucking force trying to pull her down into the tunnel. It got stronger the closer she got. Pulling her head over the edge the force got so strong that she almost lost her balance. Taking a deep breath, she leaned over and let the force ingurgitate her.

Traveling through the tunnel didn't feel like she was falling. It was more like she was riding on a wind that embedded her. It was hard to tell in which position she was in, if she was upside-down or non-inverted, or if she was going vertical or horizontal.

The tunnel started to light up in a lighter shade of gray compared to the black darkness that had been covering her eyes for a while. The sucking force ended abrupt when the pipe spat her out in a small circular room. She quickly unfolded her back paws and landed on the hard stone floor.

The room seemed to be some kind of halt there many different tunnels crossed. The ceilings were covered with circular opening, some with a sign above them telling which destination they lead to. Zings came from the pipes as they picked up noises from over ground. Mundi stood in the middle of the room.

"This way!" He pointed at an opening in the ceiling right above him. He tog fixed his eyes on the tunnels center and jumped up, letting the force catch him.

Chilli copied him and swished upwards.

The tunnel ended in the center of the crown of the tree that grew in the backyard of the Oswald villa. Looking down between the leafy branches at the yellow house the animals noticed that the backdoor to the kitchen stood open.

"Shall we?" Mundi asked Chilli.

Chilli made a single nod and started climbing down the bole. Mundi unleashed his wings and joined her at the ground, together they walked into the kitchen.

They had barley get over the doorstep to before Chilli quickly stretched out her front paw to stop Mundi behind her. Standing still she sniffed suspicious in the air with her high held nose, making her whiskers vibrate intensively. There is something fishy around here.

"What is it?" Mundi asked when he noticed that the chinchilla had her guard up.

Chilli tried figuring out from where the unfamiliar scent came from. She pointed at the stairs across the room and gave her companion a serious look.

"There's a stranger at the second floor?" Mundi asked when trying to read the chinchilla's body-language.

Chilli nodded.

"Then _we_ have to check it out", he said determined.

The two agents sneaked across the house and went up the stairs. They stopped by the upper step and carefully observed the upper-floor hallway.

"Now, where is our guy?" Mundi asked quiet in a serious low Bond-like voice while holding his wings in a fighting position. He couldn't help but act like this was a real mission.

Chilli sniffed in the air and carefully listened with her clipping ears. She pointed at the door to the left nearest them that was half open. That was Roxy's room.

The two animals stood along the wall next to the opening and slowly turned their heads to take a look inside. Chilli bent down a little so Mundi could lean over her back.

In the room a bed with purple coverlet was placed. On it sat Roxy and a girl with long red blond hair, long neck, a red top and a white skirt talking to each other.

"Oh! That's just Candace Flynn", Mundi whispered to Chilli, "she's a friend of Roxy."

The two girls where sitting opposite to each other so they hadn't noticed the two under covered agents. The pets took their hats off before revealing themselves in front of the door opening.

"Yeah, Stacy totally thought of you when she saw that cute purple dress."

"I just _soo_ have to check that out. Oh! There you are Mundi. And Chilli as well." the light-brown haired girl said when she saw the two animals stepping into the room.

"Wahaha! Your pets also disappear all the time?" Candace laughed. Her eyes suddenly fell at Chilli and her pupils enlarged in adore.

"Aww! What is that? It's so cute I just wanna hug it", Candace said and walked towards the two animals to pick up the little chinchilla.

"That's Becky's chinchilla, she bought her yesterday", Roxy explained and walked towards them as well, "she calls her Chilli."

Roxy bent down and let Mundi hop up on her hand.

"Aw, she _sooo_ cute", Candace said and hugged Chilli hard, "she reminds me of my old bunny Mr. Cutie Patootie. I wonder what ever happened to him. He just disappeared the same day I found him."

"Maybe he didn't liked being called Mr. Cutie Patootie", Roxy whispered to Mundi.

"What did you said?" Candace asked.

"Oh, nothing!"

Suddenly the sound of a tangerine orangutan was echoing through the room. Candace picked up her pink cellphone out of her pocket.

"Oh! It's Stacy", she said ('What a stupid ringtone!' Mundi thought), "she's probably standing outside your house now."

Candace fold up the screen and held the phone to her ear, holding Chilli in her other arm.

"Hi Stacy! … Okay, we're coming out. See ya soon! Bye!" Candace lowered the phone screen and turned to Roxy, "Ready for the trip at the mall?"

"You bet! I'm just going to feed Mundi and Chilli", Roxy said to Candace, "And I guess I have to tell Becky that we've found her chinchilla."

Becky seemed to have been worried sick over Chilli's disappearance. As soon as Roxy had passed by the information to the little blond girl she immediately threw her arms around the little rodent.

"Where have you been? I thought you'd escaped", she said with the chinchilla spread out over her blue clothed chest.

"I guess she was with Mundi all the time", Roxy assumed and shrugged. She was used to Mundi taking his daily "morning round", and since he always returned home before sunset she didn't worried that much about him flying away. She just wanted him to be happy.

"Did Mundi thought you how to plunder Mrs. Green's garden? 'Cause that's bad", Becky said and let the grip around Chilli get looser so she could look into the shiny black eyes that looked very obliviously.

'That only happened once', Mundi wanted to tell her. 'I was three months old and I didn't know those vegetables belonged to her.' Mundi rolled his eyes in his mind. Why does she always have to remind him about that?

"Come on, Becky, Mundi hasn't done that in over a year," Roxy said to her little sister.

'Thank you, Roxy!'

"By the way, can you tell mum that I'll be at the mall with my friends, so she doesn't have to make lunch for me?"

"Okay!"

"And don't forget to tell her this time."

"No, I won't!" Becky grunted frustrated.

Say, how come that girl seems to have hard remembering small things like that, yet she never forgets what happened to Mundi when he was young?

()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()

Chilli closed her left eye and focused her right one on the center of the reticle. She turned a little to the side to amend her position. BANG! The sound spread across the shooting-range when she fired the rifle. The backward going momentum made her bounce back a little.

"Very good, Agent Ch!" a man wearing a military uniform said while looking though a binocular in the direction Chilli had fired the weapon. Chilli picked up another binocular that lay on the ground next to her. Through the double combined lenses she registered a hole a little to the left of the center of a red-and-white scoreboard that was located about 50 meters (foots) ahead.

"You're making huge progressing", the man said to the somewhat pleased chinchilla.

"You might think so, Sergeant, but I don't", Mundi admitted behind them.

"I beg your pardon, Agent M?" the big man said insulted.

"Well, yeah, we all know Chilli is a talent, good at shooting and bla bla bla... But this isn't going to help her pass the test tomorrow. There are no obstacles that require the use of weapons at the level one agency test. Am I right, Chilli?"

Chilli thought for a while and realized that the parrot had a point there. There were no requires for the use of weapons. After all, they _did_ go through what was going to be on the test after lunch earlier.

They had gone down to their underground lair to make sure the family couldn't overhear the conversation.

"Okay, this is what you'll be up to", Mundi had said after he had pulled out a bunch of documents and his computer from his tiny unseen backpack. He connected the laptop to the big screen on the monitor that usually showed Major Monogram's face.

"You're going to be released into five different rooms, each one containing an obstacle that you got five minutes to solve. If you don't manage to solve the obstacle during the registered time limit you may still continue to next room, but you'll lose a lot of points.

Between the rooms, you'll be transported by an elevator. Now, this is important, during the transport you get to either listen to or read a text that will give you a clue to a password. That password is needed to exit the last room, thereby passing the whole test.

The unspent time from the other four rooms will be added to the last remaining five minutes in the fifth room, giving you longer time to solve the last obstacle. I believe that's going to be the trickiest part for you."

Chilli carefully listened to every word Mundi said. She now understood why the theoretical part of the test was so important. She really needs to study hard.

"Remember, you don't _have_ to solve the last obstacle to pass the test, but, as I said earlier, you will lose a lot of points that the judges hands out. If you manage to do really good at the other moments you might compensate for that."

Mundi started pressing some keys on the monitor and clicked on a file that contained information about the construction of each room.

"I bet you'll be waltzing through room three and four, and probably even the second one", Mundi said after they'd checked through the basic structure of the five obstacles. "The first one is mostly made in a way to shock the attender and to test how well their minds can handle stress. The reasons why they've decided to start with this obstacle is pretty clever considering mostly are very nervous at the beginning. Just remember to stay calm, and then you'll easy find a way to solve the puzzle.

Every obstacle can be solved in different ways. The judges will look more at how you solve them rather than if. They won't necessarily judge you bad if you don't solve the obstacles in "the right" way. Of course, it also depends on _who_ it is that judges. Some judges might praise you for taking use of your own advantages while others might be stricter and ridiculously picky."

Mundi suddenly sighed frustrated in a way that made Chilli believe he'd probably gone through something like that.

"Anyway", the parrot continued, "the judges will score how well you do on a scale from one to ten, one giving you low points and ten giving you… well, I think that is kind of obvious."

He picked up the pile of documents, which had been lying at the monitor, and started flip through them.

"Getting a ten is really rare. During whole my time at the agency, which has been about one and a half year, so far, I've only received three tens for all the tests I've taken."

He pulled out a document that showed an unfilled result board and gave it to Chilli.

"You will receive points in ten different moments. The first five is for how well you do in each room and the other five is for how well you do in general in skill, speed, focus, intelligence and creativity.

Like I said before, the judges will look more at _how_ you make use of these five moments. For example, you might be very good at running, but you will only receive high points if you can show that you know how to control it. I heard that Sergei the Snail actually got pretty good points in speed, and I don't think it was because he was fast, but rather that he knew how to take advantage of his slow movements.

And, again, it all depends on the judges. I wonder which three will be judging tomorrow. Let's check!"

He kept flipping through the documents.

"Let's see… Ah, here it is! Oh no!"

Chilli reacted to the ominous last words coming from the parrot's beak. Mundi noticed her startled movement.

"Ops! Sorry, I didn't mean to sound so concerned."

She frowned and stared at him with a very determined, yet slightly worried, look and crossed her front legs in front of her white chest. 'Spill it, Mundi!'

He questioned himself if he really should tell her about the bad news, but since he'd already blew that he'd better tell her it all. ('Me and my big beak!') He pulled out the document and showed it to her.

"Agent H, Herman the Hedgehog. He is a very tough judge and very hard to impress. Every time he has judged me, he has never given me anything over an eight."

Chilli took a closer look at the picture of the beige hedgehog that was placed to the upper left of the document over the pictures of two other agents. He didn't look like a tough judge.

'He's actually kind of cute', she thought. Though looks can be deceiving, she kept in mind.

"Anyway, let's take a look at the other two", Mundi said quickly in hope to get Chilli's self-esteem back on track. "Next up is Agent P, Perry the Platypus."

Mundi pointed at the middle picture that showed a teal colored platypus agent with a very serious look.

"He _might_ go tough on you, but he is also very fair. He actually gave me a ten for creativity on this test. I think it was because in the third room, instead of trembling after the key I used one of my feathers to pick the lock. Too bad you're not able to do that.

And last, but not least, we have Agent Silent G, Newton the Gnu, not to be confused by Agent G. Agent G is Gary the Gander, by the way. I think that goose has a crush on me. He probably doesn't know that I'm not a girl anymore."

Mundi started to stare wondering out into empty space. Then he noticed that Chilli was looking at him very baffled.

"Okay, back to Agent _Silent_ G", Mundi said, quickly getting back to Earth. "You might be on to something here. That gnu is actually much friendlier than he looks like. You may receive high scores from him. Just don't get too confident. That will only make you lose focus.

Now, let's summarize what we've got here. We have the good judge, the bad judge and the fair judge. That gives a pretty equal set-up, I think. If you work really hard you might actually be able to get this."

Chilli agreed. Now when she knew what she was up at she was more determined than she'd ever been in her entire seven-week-long life.


End file.
